


Failure

by Steel_Feather



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, death mention, i'm sorry i hurt the bean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:34:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23539957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steel_Feather/pseuds/Steel_Feather
Summary: Peter isn't always fast enough to save everyone.





	Failure

Academically speaking, it’s fascinating how thin the line between success and failure can be. It seems fragile, easily crossed until it’s not. Until it’s too late and a steel wall separates the two.

Peter has failed at many things in his life, he knows. In a way, he has absorbed the guilt of his mistakes, using it to fuel himself, a quiet fire that burns in the depths of his soul. He remembers each event, every day that he wasn’t _enough,_ didn’t do enough. Sometimes he forces himself to relive them, focusing on how to be better.

The night Uncle Ben had died; that’s his fault, and he can’t tell Aunt May _why,_ because he’s dead set on protecting her from the same fate. When he broke down, on the day of the funeral, she just held him, rocking him back and forth as she told him, over and over, that _of course_ it wasn’t his fault. But he knows better. He was fourteen years old and stupid, but that doesn’t change anything.

The day he almost sank the Staten Island Ferry, when Mr. Stark took the suit back. He remembers the fear of the passengers, a palpable thing shuddering against his skin as he desperately tried to hold on, thinking wildly that maybe he could buy some time for them. If he closes his eyes, he can still feel the tearing sensation as his shoulders were pulled, only an instant from being ripped out of socket. He wasn’t going to let go; he would have held on until his body ripped in two if he had to, because it was _his fault._ It still hadn’t hurt as much as the disappointment in Mr. Stark’s eyes, the vein fluttering in his jaw as he asked for the suit back. In that moment, he had confirmed what Peter feared most: he wasn’t enough.

Peter can recall the feeling when he worked his way back into Tony Stark’s good graces, practically crawling back up by his bloodied fingertips. He was so happy to have the suit back, thrilled at the implicit validation. He thought that it would only get better from there.

What an idiot he’d been.

Peter feels the steel wall of his failure rising to meet him, in the form of shocked brown eyes far below, going wide and blank as her body lies in a crumpled heap on the concrete. She had barely had time to be afraid.

He doesn’t know her—will _never_ know her, now—but he’s the reason she’s dead. She couldn’t have even been thirty yet, he registers distantly. Landing on the sidewalk, he approaches her and checks mechanically for a pulse, confirming what he already knows.

Time seems to slow to a crawl, the colors sickly-bright as he stares down at her in dawning horror. The bank robbers he had been pursuing are gone, forgotten for the moment. In the scope of things, they suddenly don’t matter.

“Mommy?” a small voice calls.

He doesn’t want to turn around, but something pulls him, like a puppet on a set of cruel strings, and he sees a little boy standing behind him, slightly out of breath and staring. He has her eyes. He has her eyes, and Peter can’t breathe right, a strange spasming starting in his lungs.

The boy is roughly the same age Peter was when his parents left him for the last time, which is a strange thought to have, but now he’s thinking about the times he cried for them during the first few months he lived with Uncle Ben and Aunt May. He remembers how much his heart hurt. How confused he had been. Later, the anger he had learned to tamp down.

_“Mommy?”_ The boy is scared, and a crowd is gathering, and Peter knows he should say something. He should crouch down, explain things to the boy in the best way he can, and make sure he isn’t alone before the police arrive. He should do all these things, but Peter is a kid too, and the situation is really sinking in now, the sounds and smells and colors all pressing in to his mind too intensely, his own heartbeat thundering in his ears as the little boy starts to scream, tiny hands on his mother’s face—

He runs, using his webs to launch himself up and away, moving on autopilot as he travels a few blocks and lands in an empty alley. He promptly lifts his mask just enough to retch violently into a dumpster, coughing harshly.

When that’s over, he sinks to the ground, back against the filthy alley wall, and shudders his way through each uneven breath for what feels like an eternity. At some point, he had started crying, and the tears soak into the fabric of the mask, turning cold as they finally run dry much later.

His eyes feel puffy and hot, his lungs spasming a little less with each deep, steady breath he forces himself to take.

When he gets up, he moves stiffly, like an old man. He makes his way quietly back to the small apartment in Queens that used to feel safe, crawling in through the window and stripping out of the suit. Then he collapses into the bed in his boxers, drawing the blankets around himself in a cocoon. It’s warm and dark, and he wishes it made everything better.

A soft knock comes on the door, Aunt May speaking quietly through the crack. He can see the hall light shining through her hair, picking up glints of red.

“I know it’s late,” she whispers, “but did you want to watch a movie in the living room? It’s been a while since we did a classic comedy night…”

“I have school in the morning,” he says, voice perfectly level. “Rain check?”

He’s not sure when he became better at concealing his emotions from his aunt.

She sighs. “Sure thing, Peter.” The door begins to close, but she pauses, the curve of her cheek just visible. Her mouth is slightly downturned. “Peter?”

“Mm-hm?”

“You know you can tell me anything…right?”

“Of course,” he lies. She murmurs a soft “love you” as she closes his door, which he returns.

When she’s gone, he lies perfectly awake, reliving the events of that evening, taking the pain as his due. He had failed again, after all.

_His fault._

**Author's Note:**

> I know it may not be completely clear, but the woman was killed by one of the criminals Peter was chasing. He doesn't point this out, because he's kind of an unreliable narrator in this story.


End file.
